For 10 years I paid the insurance company $1,000 every year. That's $10,000! But when I cashed in the policy they sent me only $5,800. Where did the rest of my money go?

The rest of the money paid for insurance. You were entitled to only the cash surrender value — that is, the amount you had paid to "pre-fund" insurance in your old age. The amount would have been even less if you had borrowed money that had not yet been repaid.